


Spartacus: Legacy

by Harmonious_wordsmith



Category: Andy Whitfield (Actor), Jai Courtney (Actor), Spartacus - Fandom, Spartacus Series (TV), Spartacus: Blood and Sand, Varro - Fandom
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-06-12
Updated: 2015-06-12
Packaged: 2018-04-04 00:17:02
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,482
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/4119720
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Harmonious_wordsmith/pseuds/Harmonious_wordsmith
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>SPOILERS**<br/>Spartacus: Blood and Sand S1E10 "Party Favors"<br/>If you haven't seen this episode and plan to watch it, read no further.<br/>Rated for Violence.<br/>I didn't like the way the writers decided to end the first season, beginning with the crappy events of episode 10, so I wrote my own ending.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Spartacus: Legacy

**Author's Note:**

> Following the Exhibition honoring Numerius on his birthday, Spartacus and Varro await the ruling over their match.

Thumb’s down.   
A gasp of intrigue rolled through the spectators.  
That couldn’t be.   
“Apologies Magistrate, it was agreed that this was an exhibition only, not a fight to the death.”  
“Numerius has made his decision. I will reimburse you the cost of the man.”  
Spartacus and Varro watched, dumbfounded, as their master caved under pressure yet again.   
“Proceed.”  
Spartacus knew he couldn’t. He wouldn’t. He would never take the life of his friend.   
“Spartacus.” Batiatus called in warning, but his champion stood reluctant. With a nod from their master, the soldiers stationed for security surrounded the two.  
“Don’t.” Varro pleaded his friend, defeat evident in his voice. Spartacus ignored him, already counting the soldiers, finding the easiest way out.   
There was none.  
“They will kill us both,” he urged again, looking up at his friend, “you have no choice.”  
“There is always a choice.” Spartacus whispered as a glimmer of a plan began to take root behind his eyes. But Varro couldn’t see it,  
“Not this time.” He offered his brother a forced smile, thinking of his family, resigning himself to his coming execution.  
The onlookers hold their breath, anxious for blood, as Spartacus raised his sword, poised to strike down his opponent.   
“Take heart, brother. You will see your family this night.” Varro stared, brows furrowed, until he saw his friend wink.   
Oh.  
Spartacus brought down his sword with a roar, breezing past his friend’s shoulder and lodging in the stomach of the guard behind him. As Varro felt the steel slip past him he rolled forward, taking up his discarded blade and cutting down the two guards before him even as he knelt. The two gladiators stood back to back, their swords biting, striking down every guard as they would in the arena.   
Varro elbowed one guard in the cheek, knocking off his helmet and leaving him spitting out teeth and blood, then he brought his blade down in the man’s bare head, cleaving it nearly in two.   
Glancing over his shoulder, he saw a guard bearing down on Spartacus; he wrenched his blade from the dead man’s skull and charged, embedding his gladius in the warrior’s throat, twisting the blade for good measure, and shielding his face as he was showered with arterial spray  
Finally, Spartacus sliced through the air with a bellow, relieving the last guard of his head. Then there was silence. The mangled remains of fallen soldiers littered the ground around the Champion and his friend, leaving them standing as sentries in a lake of blood and bone. The crowd looked on, stunned at the unexpected display, none knowing how to react,   
“Leave us.” Batiatus commanded, calling for more guards from the courtyard, “Everyone out!” he yelled when no one stirred. Now the guests, though reluctantly, still wanting to witness more bloodshed and gore, began hastily filing out the door, murmuring amongst themselves, the rumors and scandal already beginning to travel.  
“Father!” Numerius complained, this was not how gladiators were meant to behave.   
“Hold your tongue, boy.” Spartacus called, the child shrinking back, “You know not what game you play.”  
“It seems you have lost control of your champion, Batiatus, assuming you possessed control to begin with. Seize them.” Calavius commanded, gesturing his own men forward, but a loud crack stopped them in their tracks. All remaining eyes turned to see Oenomaus, poised with whip and gladius,   
“You will not touch them.” The trainer growled, stepping through blood and carnage to stand beside Varro and Spartacus, the latter sparing him a glance,   
“You would condemn yourself beside us?” he asked, though expected no reply. His only answer was the sound of his fellow gladiators taking up arms and finding place at his back.   
“Revolt?” The Magistrate breathed, “What a fascinating Ludus you run, Batiatus, that your men are so bold as to defy you, especially in such elevated company.” Taking hold of his Numerius’ arm, Calavius urged his wife and son toward the exit in haste, so anxious to avoid the oncoming conflict, he left his handful of guards behind to do their job in his absence.   
“You will stand down, all of you. If you surrender, Spartacus and Varro will be the only two to receive punishment. If you do not, you will each face crucifixion.” Batiatus threatened, attempting to regain control,  
“What was that you were saying about my family?” Varro muttered, as the men closed in,  
“Worry not, brother. I will get you safely to your wife.” He looked his friend in the eyes, “I swear it.”  
"Stand down" Batiatus commanded, his men closing in slowly.  
The gladiators all exchanged looks, their freedom so close they could taste it.  
Spartacus fixed his glare on his Dominus, he couldn’t afford crucifying all of his fighters, and everyone knew it.   
This ends tonight.  
“Now!” their master yelled,  
"No." Spartacus growled. He leapt forward, lunging at the guard before him, Varro following close behind, echoing his cry.  
Though outnumbered three to one, the guards stood no chance against the desperate fighters. Their years of abuse, lacking good food and rest, being treated as cattle, all came to a head, and tonight was the night they took their freedom by force.  
Amid the chaos of battle, hewn limbs scattered amongst rivers of blood and spilled entrails, Batiatus grasped his wife’s arm, urging her out the back door.  
“Spartacus!” Oenomaus called, directing his attention to the retreating back of their master.   
“Go!” Varro insisted, his steel jabbing smoothly through a soldier’s forehead and protruding from the back of his helmet, “You are well protected here.” He slashed at another man, severing his hand at the wrist, releasing a fountain of blood as the guard’s sword clattering uselessly to the ground, he then dispatched the foe with a final downward thrust through his shoulder. “The gods have granted you opportunity for vengeance, brother. Go take it.”  
With a grateful smirk and a nod to his comrade, Spartacus took up the fallen guard’s sword, and ran. Cutting down any who came between him and his goal, he rounded the corner into a courtyard, across the pool before him he saw a flash of red darting between the pillars: Lucrecia’s hair, and across her shoulder, clad in rich green, Batiatus’ arm hastily lead her to the door,  
“Batiatus!” Spartacus screamed, causing a startled pause, then he hurled his sword forward. The moment the hilt left his hand he knew it would strike true, and that it did. Lucrecia stopped in her tracks with a gasp, her husband knocking her to her knees with his momentum. He looked at her in confusion until his gaze settled on the blade protruding from her stomach.   
“No.” he breathed, his heart sinking, “No, you’re going to be okay, come on.” He tried to lift her, tried to get her to her feet, but she couldn’t stand, the blade had cut into her spinal column.   
They looked at each other, crouched beside the wall, both knowing she was going nowhere.  
Running footsteps slowed to a stop at the archway beside the couple. Lucrecia looked at her husband in a daze, unable to process her pain, the reached up to touch his cheek, but he wasn’t looking at her anymore. He stared in horror as the champion of Capua stood over him, brandishing his sword,  
“You stole my wife from me. I thought it appropriate to return the service.” Lucrecia tried to speak to her husband, but all that came out was a gurgling cough, spewing blood down the front of her gown. Batiatus still did not even spare her a glance. Instead, knowing Spartacus meant to slaughter him, he stumbled to his feet, backing clumsily down the corridor and out to the front garden toward a bronze statue of a gladiator in battle. His champion stalked after him.  
“You speak of warriors, honor, the glory of gladiators.” Spartacus taunted, the slaver’s footing faltering as he shuffled backwards down the stone steps, “You see yourself above us. See us as inferior, yet your love lay dying and you think only of your own skin.” Batiatus’ eyes flitted back to his dying wife, bleeding out just a few paces away, her eyes dulling but still betraying her broken heart.  
He left her. Run through, spilling her blood, unable to move.  
Alone.  
“How can you think yourself a man of honor?” the Thracian growls, looming over his prey, Batiatus tripped backwards over the uneven flagstones, as Spartacus pressed on, his goal finally within reach. He raised his sword, ready to end the hell he had been put through, avenge his wife, reclaim his own life. Suddenly, glancing behind his enemy, an idea occurred to him, and as the man stumbled once more, his sandal catching on the edge of a stone, Spartacus kicked Batiatus firmly in the gut, causing him to lose his balance, and plunge with a yelp onto the bronze sword held by the statue at his back.   
Lucrecia watched from the corridor, seeing the blood bloom on her huband’s robes, the fabric ripping as he sank slowly backwards, aided by the weight of Spartacus’ foot pressing on his stomach, eventually going limp as his heart was ripped in two.   
Sitting, paralyzed, she couldn’t even bring herself to cry.  
“So noble of you so fall on your sword, Dominus.” Spartacus sneered, turning his back on the wretch for the last time.   
He hurried back into the Ludus, stepping over Lucrecia’s limp body, hearing her labored breathing, but not even sparing her a glance. His brothers needed his help. Reentering the room he was greeted by the sounds of battle: clanging steel, splintering wood, the wet spatter of spilled blood, and yelling. Voices raised in victory or agony, the resulting roar was deafening.  
Finally, Crixus cuts down the last of Batiatus’ men, severing an arm and a leg before staking him to the ground through his temple. With a glance around the room, realizing their victory, the men raised a cry for freedom, until interrupted by Agron and Duro as they dragged a struggling woman to the center of the room from the corner, where she’d taken to hiding after seeing she had no escape.  
“What have we here?” Duro snickered, burying his nose in her blond curls.   
“Get your hands off of me! My husband will hear about this.”   
“You’re right.” Spartacus said, stepping forward, “You’re absolutely right, Ilythia. He will hear of it. He’ll hear every detail of how you cried, and screamed, and begged for death as we gutted you. And he will hear it from me.”   
Ilythia paled in horror, knowing there is nothing stopping him,  
“Lucrecia! Batiatus!” she called,  
“Dead. Run through and drained. The only masters of this house still living are in this room.” Spartacus gestured to the men in the room, all leering at her, each devising their own method of torture for her. “What do you think men?” The gladiators all extended a fist, thumbs horizontal.   
They got to make the choice this time.  
One by one, each thumb pointed down.  
“The men have spoken, my lady.” Varro announced, spitting the title with disdain.   
“Step back, boys.” Spartacus commanded and gestured for Varro to take his place beside him, “She’s ours.”  
She whimpered, tears streaming down her face as she shrank back, away from the two gladiators, but the men behind her kicked her forward. With a nod from Spartacus, Varro stepped toward her and swung, his blade slicing through the air and striking true along Ilythia’s gut, she fell to her knees with a harrowing scream, gripping her gushing stomach, watching her dress stain red as she was bathed in her own blood. She tried to staunch the flow as Spartacus took a fistful of her hair, wrenching her head back to look him in the eye. Her hand slipped from the wound on her stomach, leaving nothing to close the incision, her organs spilling forth.   
“You deserve no less than this end. Domina.” Spartacus snarled the undeserved title at the woman, letting loose his grip on her hair and allowing her to fall onto her side, her head clouded in pain. She felt her strength waning quickly, every pained cry choking off in her throat. Before she could lay back, Spartacus grasped a loop of her spilled intestines, dragging the length from her stomach, still flowing with blood, and ripping agonized, gurgling screams from her. He looped the still-warm organ thrice around her neck, pulling as taut as the flesh would allow, effectively stopping the dwindling flow of air into Ilythia’s dying lungs. Her face reddened, then shaded to a pale blue, her pitiful fight slowly leaving her.   
He pulled tighter.   
Her eyes clouded.   
Tighter, his hands slipping through blood.   
One more gasp.   
Tighter.   
The flesh of the organ tore.  
The intestines unraveled themselves, leaving Ilythia gulping in strained, limited gasps, her color turned from blue to ashen grey as she slumped over, laying down to die in the filth around her, yet Spartacus felt a weight of failure settle on his shoulders,  
“Spartacus.” He heard the growl behind him, turning just in time to duck, slipping backwards in the river of blood as Varro swung his blade with a roar, slicing easily through the pale, proud neck of Glabor’s whore.   
\- - - -   
“Do you honestly think this is an appropriate bedtime story, Varro?”   
“What? I’m telling him about his father’s heroic work.”   
“Maybe you could wait on some of the more ‘heroic’ stories until he’s old enough to know what a whore is. Or at least tone down the violence until then.” Varro gave a chuckle at her concern,  
“He will have to learn eventually.” He sat on the edge of his son’s bed after tucking him in for the night,   
“What happened to Spartacus, Papa?” Janus asks,  
“Ah, he’s out fighting for freedom.”   
“Why aren’t you fighting with him?”   
“I wouldn’t let him go.” Aurelia interjects with a smirk. Varro nods matter-of-factly at his son, making him giggle.  
“Now it’s time for sleep.” He kisses Janus on the forehead, snuffing out the light beside his bed before leaving the room.  
“I’ve told you before, those stories are just too much for him right now, especially just before bed.”   
“He’ll be fine.” He reassures, pulling his wife to him,  
“Wait, careful.” She scolds lightly, “I just got her to go to sleep.” He takes a moment to peek at baby Juno, his six month old daughter, and kisses her lightly on the forehead, making her squirm in her sleep.  
“Let’s put her to bed.” He whispered, kissing Aurelia chastely, and following her into their room.  
As he lay in bed that night, under the same roof as his wife and children, Varro thanked the gods for causing his path to cross with Spartacus’, and fell asleep, hugging Aurelia close, knowing he and his family, his legacy, was safe.


End file.
